


lightning in a bottle

by stormwarnings



Series: fairy skies and pretty eyes [1]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Magic, Multi, less of an end, more of a beginning, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:08:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24510580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stormwarnings/pseuds/stormwarnings
Summary: Andrew is water, quiet and powerful and deceptively calm. Andrew is the rushing stream and the deep-flowing river, the kind that flows and swirls and says to the rock, you are in my way, now, but a rock cannot move. Someday, soon, I will wear you down. And you will be gone, because what is time, to a river?
Relationships: Aaron Minyard & Andrew Minyard, Katelyn/Aaron Minyard, Kevin Day & Andrew Minyard, Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Series: fairy skies and pretty eyes [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1805626
Comments: 12
Kudos: 127





	lightning in a bottle

**Author's Note:**

> this is a quick thing, because I'm a little stuck on the story I should actually be writing. but it's also a love letter to thunderstorms and magic, my two favorite things. enjoy :)

Andrew and Aaron are a funny combination, for the fact that they’re twins and they’re magic and their magic is _different_.

Aaron is fire, all anger and a slow-burning fuse. But people seem to forget – fire, in the end, can be destruction. But it is also what destroys the old growth, and gives room for the new.

Andrew is water, quiet and powerful and deceptively calm. Andrew is the rushing stream and the deep-flowing river, the kind that flows and swirls and says to the rock, _you are in my way, now, but a rock cannot move. Someday, soon, I will wear you down. And you will be gone, because what is time, to a river?_

(Sometimes Andrew gets a little lost in time, like that.)

Fights between Andrew and Aaron used to be jarring because of their magic, the heat rising from Aaron’s skin as his emotions heated up, sizzling and meeting with the water beading on Andrew’s. Their fights used to cause damage, Aaron lighting a couch on fire and Andrew exploding the kitchen sink.

_They_ used to cause damage, because oh, there was once a boy named Drake and he made Andrew _scared_ , and when the rain started falling and Aaron could feel it in his bones, Aaron lit Drake on fire.

They live in a better place, now. They are better, now.

Nicky lives in Germany, with his husband, Erik. They have small magic, running a shop that sells charms and potions, a shop hidden in the wall of a city, a shop that you have to be looking, in order to find. But Nicky is always looking, in order to find, and so he found Andrew and Aaron, and picked them up and brought them to Betsy Dobson.

Betsy Dobson is the very stereotype of what one would call a witch. She has a cottage in rural Virginia with a nice garden, and she rents the rest of her land out for people to keep horses and cows on. The cottage is nice – it has a kitchen with stainless steel countertops and a fridge big enough for Andrew to keep lots of ice cream, and also a cauldron over an open fireplace where she can make her potions. She even has the big hat. Andrew tells her that she ought to be careful, or someone might try to burn her at the stake.

Bee laughs, because she knows that Andrew is concerned, always concerned, about the protection of those he cares about. She says she’ll be alright, she has been for a while, and Andrew can feel the tips of his ears burning.

It’s late spring now, and Aaron and Andrew drive the Jeep back to Bee’s house, and Andrew wants to call it home, in his head. Home, where he can feel the water, deep below the ground, and the creek in the woods. Home, where Aaron is learning healing instead of destruction, and where Andrew can go out in the garden on days when the darkness in his head feels too big to contain.

“Are you going over to Kevin’s?” Aaron asks, but the nice thing about the Jeep is that if the windows are down and the doors are off Andrew can pretend to ignore him. Aaron asks it again. “Are you?”

“Yes,” Andrew finally responds.

“I think I’m going to have Kate over, then,” Aaron says.

“Do what you want,” Andrew tells him. “I don’t care.”

Aaron scoffs. They both know that’s not true.

So Andrew finds himself driving to Kevin’s.

Kevin is a strange person. He’s a different kind of magic – not a witch, like Bee, nor the kind of elementalist that are Andrew and Aaron. He’s a sorcerer, a very good sorcerer, and he used to be one of three.

Now he is one. He lives with his found father, Wymack (a complicated story – Andrew doesn’t like how involved he was), and Wymack’s wife, Abby (who is friends with Bee), and their adopted daughter, Dan.

Unfortunately, Kevin is quite genius (though Andrew hates to admit it) but single-minded, and frequently frazzled, frustrated, or some combination thereof.

Andrew knocks on the door, and then stands in wait. He flexes his fingers, feels the water running through the sewers and the pipes and through the ground, to the roots of the plants grown by Abby. There’s water in the air, too, because Virginia in May, that almost-summer time, is humid and hot. The water hangs heavy in the air, and Andrew plucks it straight out, letting it bead in his hand, on his fingers, dripping and lovely.

“Hey, Minyard.”

The spell is broken. Andrew glances at the door. It’s Dan, the non-magical girl who nonetheless helps Abby with all her spells, the non-magical girl who has still gained Andrew’s respect. “Wilds,” he greets.

“He’s upstairs,” Dan says. “Not sure what he’s doing, not sure I want to know. There’s been tiny little explosions the whole afternoon, and Abby is _this close_ to putting a silencing spell on his room.”

“Good idea,” Andrew says. “Then you’ll never know if he dies.”

Dan laughs, and lets Andrew in.

The inside of this house is a bit different from Bee’s. It’s a combination of magical things and non-magical things, of Abby’s plants and charms, and Wymack’s signed soccer jerseys and coaching awards.

Unfortunately, there’s a boom and a rumble of thunder, and Andrew can both feel and hear it as rain starts pouring down outside.

“ _Kevin_!” Wymack roars from the kitchen.

Kevin comes down the stairs. He’s frazzled, but more importantly, he’s not alone. There’s a boy with him, a boy with blue eyes and auburn curls, and something crackling between his fingers.

Dan sighs heavily.

* * *

The boy’s name is Neil.

He’s in some way related to the whole fiasco that brought Kevin to his father, but the only thing Andrew cares about is that Kevin pleads Wymack to let Neil stay with them.

So Andrew observes Neil, and thinks, _hm, he is dangerous but he is quiet._ Because Neil has lightning hissing between his fingers, thunder in his voice, a tornado in his hair. Neil is powerful, but he hides it, flinching and stepping away from corners like a dog with his tail between his legs.

_Hm, he might be an issue._

Andrew is briefly jealous (and isn’t _that_ a funny joke) because suddenly Neil is taking up all of Kevin’s time. But Kevin says, “Lend me your strength,” with those puppy-dog, mad-sorcerer eyes, and suddenly the three of them are inextricably bound.

So Abby brings Kevin and Neil over to the Dobson’s for dinner.

Aaron has Katelyn over, and Bee and Abby are whirling around in the kitchen, putting rotisserie chicken in the oven and setting a potion the color of lavender to boil in the cauldron, and Kevin is watching the potion with intense fascination.

Andrew sees Neil slip out the back door, so he follows.

It’s an evening for a good Virginia thunderstorm. It’s been building all day in the heat, and Andrew can feel the heaviness of the rain clouds, high above. He can see Neil, already out in the fields, a small figure on the highest point of the rolling green hills, see Neil outlined against the sky and the Blue Ridge Mountains, far off in the distance.

By the time Andrew reaches Neil, the clouds are swirling. They really are beautiful, all shades of black and grey and silver, making the green of the hills seem over-saturated.

Neil’s just standing there, his arms out, feeling the breeze rolling the storm in, rustling the grasses.

Andrew stops and stands a respectful distance away, all too used to Kevin and his spell-making shenanigans.

But Neil speaks to him, even though he’s still facing the mountains. “You’ve got magic too, haven’t you?”

Andrew scoffs. What kind of question is that? “Yes.”

Neil turns, and his eyes aren’t quite blue, they’re also sparks and lightning. “Can you feel it?” He says reverently, looking up at the clouds.

Andrew says, “I can feel the rain in the clouds. And the air.” He points towards the ridgeline. “Can feel the sheets of it moving towards us.”

“But the lightning,” Neil says, and Andrew takes a step back, because Neil might actually be _humming_. There’s a low vibration in the air, centered around Neil, and Andrew isn’t even sure if Neil’s feet are still touching the ground.

It’s an otherworldly kind of beauty, not unlike the days when Kevin is buzzing off the high of a well-woven spell.

Neil breathes in, and a roll of thunder answers him, and he laughs, throwing his hands up. Andrew almost smiles without even meaning to, and then there’s a flash and an ear-splitting blast of thunder, and a very strange smell.

Andrew blinks very quickly, trying to get the spots out of his vision. He can feel the bands of rain moving closer and closer.

Oh, Kevin might kill him if Neil died. “Neil?”

“I’m right here.”

Andrew’s vision, slowly coming back, reveals Neil still standing, holding a ball of _something_ in his hands. It’s fire, then it’s sparks, then it’s a key or a feather or a flower. Neil holds it out to Andrew, whose instincts tell him that this…this lightning (because that’s what it is) is not for him. He may control water, but he does not control this storm. Andrew shakes his head.

Neil shrugs his thin shoulders. He says, “Watch.”

Then he tosses his hands up, releasing the lightning like one would release a bird into flight. It’s tangible and not, all at the same time, and as it leaves Neil’s hands it arches and forks, catching in the clouds like a burning spiderweb, and disappearing just as quickly.

Neil smiles, something wild and fierce, and Andrew thinks, _oh, he might be trouble._

**Author's Note:**

> if you enjoyed this let me know (and tell me - should i should write more in this universe?)


End file.
